Sunday, 23 February 2014

Who is R.A.J.E Designs?

Check me out! Years of podcasting about films and randomness and then a good year blogging about films and, well, randomness, I have built up some great connections with some interesting people.

At the start of 2014 I put forth an aim to get the #NOTlistening brand more heard (see what I tried to do there? No? Stupid? Yes probably) and by doing this I wanted to get involved and start chatting to interesting and creative people across the podcasts and here at the blog. This includes Actors, Actresses, Directors, Singers and Models. Also This has allowed me to reach out to other cool people, such as people in the fashion world, writers, other bloggers and more. If they are interesting and creative, then I am interested in chatting.So todays post is all about RAJE Designs. They are a new and exciting Fashion company. I was able to get in contact with Roanna from the company and ask her a few questions. So here we go.

ME: So tell me about RAJE designs. Who are you and what are you all about?

R: Well, we are R~A~J~E (Roanna, Abbie, Joey, Emily) and we are a design led, ethical fashion company with a passion for designing to flatter different body shapes and skin tones while producing in the most beautiful, least harmful way possible. This is all tied together with the desire to create progressive, inventive designs inspired by street style, the every day and our adventures.

ME: You say your clothes are ethical. What do you mean by that ?

R: Many things! For a start our Adventure collection is all produced in London - it's entirely sweat shop-horrible-labour-exploitation free - huraah! All of our printed jersey and silk is digitally printed which is an incredibly efficient printing method that minimises waist. Out T Shirt collection is screen printed with water based inks and made in a very happy, definitely not a sweat shop factory in L.A. This is only just the beginning though, being an ethical company is a process of continued improvement Part of our mission as R~A~J~E is to improve as many lives as possible so continued scrutiny of our production is a natural part of that.

ME: So what Roles do all 4 of you girls hold in the company?

R - I head up communications, copy, PR, social media and press. I also collaborate with A on the print designs.

A - A leads on print designs and manages all of the back office responsibility. She also is my chief support on the blog.

J - J designs the garments and manages production, sizing and our processes. She contributes to the blog.

E - E heads up online visuals and acts as our photographer. She collaborates with J on the garments and also contributes to the blog.

ME: how was this all started? What got this ball rolling?

R: Back when we were just teenagers and students J got us all together to enter the 'Make Your Mark In Fashion' competition We went on to become finalists, designing a collection and showing at London Fashion Week. On the back of this success we decided to do this for real, spent a couple of years developing our identity and officially launched last year! It's a non stop, ridiculously busy, mostly insane but always brilliant adventure that non of us want to stop.

ME: You do women's clothes and unisex clothes. Are you more focused on female fashion or would you like to expand into more standalone male clothes?

R: We love both! Our womenswear collection is larger at the moment as the market for ethical is stronger in that area, however we are already planning a menswear collection just as soon we were big enough to manage it.

ME: Explain the idea of the shape sizing system. I think a lot of women out there would love this idea.

R: While we are all devout fashionistas we also believe in the incredible good of dressing for your shape - working with your body and not against it. By simply knowing your shape, the ins and outs of dressing it we think you can unlock a much more confident, together and directional style. Body shape research has been around for a while now but it's rarely integrated into the design process, R~A~J~E pioneer using expert knowledge of body shapes along with skilled pattern cutting and print driven design to create beautiful, figure flattering pieces.

ME: so what is the future of RAJE?

R: Bright, beautiful and one hell of an adventure. It will be collaborative, fast-paced and a challenge as we focus on raising our profile and making ethical clothing incredibly covetable.

RAJE were lovely enough to send me a T shirt from their site. I loved it. I am a bit of a T shirt hoarder so the opportunity to get a T shirt was right up my alley.

ME: thanks for the t shirt. If I ordered a dress what size system would I fall into? will you do the same body shape system for mens clothes? ;-)

R: I would have to do a body shape consultation to tell you that! Adding menswear body shapes to the website it just one of the jobs on my todo list but for now you can amuse yourself with the womens: http://www.weareraje.co.uk/#!body-shapes/c1e2l

Actress Petra Bryant Showcasing some of RAJE Designs Clothes.

So Thank you Roanna from RAJE for chatting to me. In the coming months we have a podcast chat lined up so we can delve more into fun chat about the company and more.